Hunt for Westvleteren

 

Food Store (2 meals, for 3)	€26
Bike rental	€12
Map @ Night-&-Day	€16
Beer @ nice cafe	€20
Dinner @ hotel restaurant	€31

 

Woke up early. Our plan is to ride to Rochefort from Namur. It's 50km -- 30 miles -- we think we can probably do it and back, but we need to start early. We download some maps on the iPad to get us going. We quickly discover that the maps on the iPad are horrendously insufficient; that the road we were going to take is basically a highway, 55mph speed limit, with no bike lanes; and Neil's bike is horrendously fit for him and his knee tendons were giving out after 10 miles.

We pull off the road, deciding to explore the countryside instead of going to Rochefort. We stop by a hotel and ask directions to Rochefort. The guys are really nice and try to help us, but they don't speak any English and my French is very rusty. They won't sell us their map, but we can purchase one at Night-&-Day, a local convenience chain. Riding back to Namur we found a Night-&-Day, at which we did indeed purchase a map. The guy working there chats with us for a bit, to "practice his English". Now you have to realize that Neil has this long hair and bandanna and basically looks like a huge hippie, and Tim and I are not far behind at this point either. So he makes the not entirely incorrect assumption that we might be interested in weed. He starts talking about some "special cigarette", and we were confused at first (remember, he doesn't speak English well, so we don't know whether he means weed or just some kind of weird cigarette). But he does mean weed! He offers us a hit of some joint he has lying around, and offers to sell us weed later if we're interested. We politely decline. Just kidding; Neil is excited to try some weed from Belgium, so we express interest and he says "at midnight when I get off work".

Kill time at beer bars in Namur, which is actually a pretty neat college town, we discovered. Cuvee Li Crochon for me at one bar; Biere du Corsaire at the next. We decide to stay at the hotel for dinner, and it's quite a classy restaurant; all the food is quite delicious, and they were able to accommodate Neil with a really good vegetarian dish.

 

Call guy (his name's Lionel) at midnight. He drives over to the hotel, and we meet him outside, hoping to do the deal and be done. Nope. He doesn't bring the weed with him; he leaves it at home and we need to ride with him to get it. He'll drive us back afterward, he promises.

Neil and Tim say "OK!" and get in his car.

*WHAT?!*

I'm sufficiently afraid. He seems like a harmless dude, but no way am I getting in this guy's car; he's probably gonna kidnap me or murder me or worse. I go back to the hotel room to wait. Meanwhile, Tim and Neil are being driven at 60mph down twisty mountain roads (speed limit is about 20mph), scared shitless of being thrown off a cliff or, if not that, just kidnapped. Guy takes 25 minutes to drive when it took him 10 minutes to get there, so I guess he's also a pretty fast driver when he doesn't have guests?

Of course, he lives with his parents in the spare bedroom. He takes Neil and Tim up to his room, sells them €50 of weed, and plays Guitar Hero Metallica with them. They considerately call me at the hotel to tell me they're OK! They bring Lionel back up to the room when they're done, and we share some of our homebrew with Lionel. He ended up just being a nice, nerdy guy. Who also drives like an insane person, but whatever.

After Lio leaves we wander down to the cliff at night.